


Give In (Or Just Give Up)

by Raehimura



Category: Pacific Rim (Movies)
Genre: Except not really because they've just been waiting for the chance, First Time, Fluff and Smut, Frottage, Getting Together, Kaiju parasite has interesting effects, Light Angst, M/M, Mildly Dubious Consent, Set before the first film, Sex Pollen, So much denial, Unsafe Laboratory Procedures
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-25
Updated: 2018-09-25
Packaged: 2019-07-17 07:23:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,597
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16090817
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Raehimura/pseuds/Raehimura
Summary: “Newton,” Hermann grinds out. “Are you telling me we could be dying right now?”“Well, I have no idea. But if you’re feeling it half as strongly as I am, there’s definite potential for bodily harm.”“And you think that giving in to these … urges will make it stop?”“I’ve seen enough Star Trek to know how sex pollen works, dude.”Hermann hears himself correct him, faintly: “It’s not a pollen; it came from an animal.”





	Give In (Or Just Give Up)

“Why are you even bothering with that thing? It’s not a kaiju.”

Hermann winces as he hears his own tone, sharp and needling when he only intended to prod. Newt had burst into the lab first thing that morning practically vibrating with excitement and proceeded to dance around exulting in a sing-song voice about the latest kaiju recovery site and the tiny organism they had recovered from its skin —  _finally, Herms, a live sample!_ — along with the sky blue smoke the thing had released.

Newt had been unbearable and impossible to shut up, despite Hermann’s best efforts, until the technicians brought in a microwave-sized tank containing what looked like a bright blue mushroom. The strange organism sat under a yellow light, occasionally pulsing and otherwise not moving.

The clearly exhausted techs signed over the tank and a long, sealed tube of smoke with wry smirks at Newt’s uncontainable excitement as he exclaimed how beautiful “she” was. Hermann frowned at their retreating backs and ignored the adoring way Newt’s fingers skittered over the tank.

Then, Newt had popped in his headphones and settled down to work in such a silent, diligent, hyper-focused way that it was almost more worrisome than pleasant. Almost.

Hermann had enjoyed nearly eight hours of blessed silence and productivity before he could no longer contain his curiosity and concern over having a live organism in the lab.

(It certainly had nothing to do with Newt’s uncharacteristic silence wrecking his concentration, paradoxically dragging Hermann’s attention back to his lab partner at every opportunity. After the tenth time he dragged his eyes away — carefully not looking at Newt as he distractedly licked Cheeto dust off his fingers, a sight he found equal parts disgustingly uncouth and unbearably distracting — Hermann gave in.)

It was time for a break. His leg ached from the prolonged hours at his chalkboards, and he was fairly certain Newton hadn’t moved from his desk-huddle all day. It looked like it was Hermann’s turn to remind them both of their inconvenient human limitations.

So he had grabbed his cane and dropped heavily into his desk chair, just on his side of the line dividing the lab. Newt jerked in surprise, pulling out his earbuds and spinning his chair to face Hermann with a stiff roll of his shoulders. He pushed at his sloppily rolled sleeves and stretched his arms above his head, lines of color rippling across skin as he arched his back until several joints popped.

And that was absolutely the moment to interrupt.

“I said, why are you bothering?”

Newt’s brows twitch at Hermann’s skeptical question, but he leans forward and gestures emphatically, eyes gleaming and voice pitchy with excitement.

“Well, no, it’s not a kaiju, but think about it man: They must have some kind of symbiotic, or even parasitic, relationship. If we learn more about it, we can discover something about the universe they come from and the ways they interact with the kaiju, which could tell us more about the kaiju themselves. Not to mention …”

Newt trails off dramatically, as he is wont to do, and brandishes the sleek tube of impossibly blue smoke. Ignoring Hermann’s eye roll, he continues with enthusiasm.

“These things interact with humans! I haven’t isolated the specific effects yet, but the substance they produce absolutely has the markers of interaction with our own biology. Isn’t that awesome?”

Hermann could admit to being slightly distracted by the boyish charm of Newt’s exuberant smile, but he was never so distracted that he’d drop a step in their habitual verbal sparring. “So you’ll be messing about with a potentially toxic gas in the lab all week? Joy.”

“Okay, first of all, have a little trust in my lab safety protocols,” Newt volleys back, a hand to his heart as if he’d been dramatically betrayed. "Second, between the guys at the recovery site and my work this morning, we’ve been able to determine that it’s not actively toxic. With like, fairly decent certainty.”

“Oh, I’m so relieved.”

Hermann’s reply is predictably dry. Newt, also predictably, ignores him.

“THIRD, at the very least, this thing could help us predict and plan for future human side effects from the kaiju. Gerty here is very important. Isn’t that right, Gerty?”

“So help me god, Newton, you did  _not_  name that thing.”

Newt just smiles, and it is decidedly not adorable, thank you very much.

“She’s gonna be hanging out with us in the lab for a while; it would be rude to keep calling her Specimen X-3244.”

“And how do you know it’s a ‘she’?” Hermann asks peevishly, just to be difficult.

Newt slaps his forehead as he turns to look at the floating creature in its glowing yellow tank. “Oh, man, you’re right. Sorry Gerty. ‘They’ pronouns from now on.”

It’s all ridiculous, as everything to do with Newt always is, but the mad scientist in question is grinning and his eyes shine with excitement and his skilled fingers are already tapping impatiently to get back to work. So Hermann takes a brief moment to memorize the vibrating, shining sight of him, and then huffs and turns to his holoscreen and the endless code of his predictive model.

His lab partner settles back in, now freely bouncing a knee and singing along to his music under his breath, but still focused and contained and blessedly out of Hermann’s hair.

Hermann keeps an eye on the creature and the container of mystery gas throughout the day — and if he happens to catch a flash of vibrant tattoos or the vicious satisfaction in smart, sharp eyes then it is mere coincidence — but though Newt experiments with a manic glee, he seems to be working as safely as ever. Hermann allows himself to relax.

That, as always, is a mistake.

From what Hermann sees from the corner of his eye before the disaster, Newt had been carefully transferring the little creature to a different tank for some test. The process unfolded slowly, but Newt had been working under the vent hood and there was nothing to make Hermann worry or even pay particular attention.

Until, in what must have been the very moment the organism hit the open air, there was a rushing sound and the smell of almonds. Hermann has just enough time to turn, see the large plume of sky blue smoke overwhelming the hood’s ventilation, and hear Newton’s muttered “Shit,” before chaos descends.

Newton lunges for the button to seal off the lab from the rest of the base and quarantine their ventilation. Hermann, well-trained, hobbles more quickly than is wise to Newton’s side, looping his cane onto a large yellow switch and pulling it down with a heavy thunk. It would initiate fans to vent the air from the lab through decades-old HEPA filters, hopefully taking along any contaminants or alien substances that were floating around — and definitely already in their lungs.

Hermann coughs and struggles to catch his breath in the thick, sweet air while turning wide eyes to his lab partner, who blinks back.

It is an odd moment of calm. Shattered impressively by Hermann’s yelling.

“Newton Geiszler, what the  _hell_  were you thinking exposing that thing without proper containment precautions!?”

“Whoa, whoa, I took every precaution I could,” Newton counters, barely containing a cough as he waves his hands defensively. “But if you hadn’t noticed, we’re facing down the end of the world here! I don’t actually have the time or resources for the whole level 4 bio-containment process. Besides, I was pretty sure the smoke was produced by a kaiju-specific reaction, so it wouldn’t reproduce in the lab.”

“Well I don’t think you’ll be winning any awards for that particular theory, you reckless  _idiot_.”

Newt’s swallow is loud in the suddenly confined space, and Hermann almost slaps him when he has the nerve to smile.

“I can’t really argue with you there. But relax, we don’t know that we’re in any danger. Maybe there won’t even be any side effects.”

But Hermann feels it already, heavy and creeping up his swaying body: heat, sweat and a restless itch. Wavering. From the look of the flush on Newton’s cheeks and the sweat dripping down his neck, he is similarly affected.

Hermann raises a hand to wipe at his forehead, pulling loose his top button to get some undoubtedly contaminated air. He wants to yell more about reckless biological scientists and their messy empirical work, but gets distracted by a sense of vertigo that has him swaying against his cane, an insistence twitch under his skin, a desperate need to  _move_  and do … something.

So distracted, in fact, that it takes him a full trembling minute to realize he is massively, painfully, desperately turned on.

His eyes skate nervously away from Newt as he feels the flush intensify along his cheeks, with their damnable pale complexion. He shifts uncomfortably and physically swallows down a hiss as the barest brush against his own pants sets his skin on fire.

The air has gone hazy around him, soft at the edges, but he marshals enough concentration to attempt to turn, discretely, and hide his condition from Newt. Newt, who is standing oddly close, and Hermann knows he should step back and put some distance between them if Newt won’t, but the thought is distant and he finds himself loath to move.

Newt’s blunt fingers are busily loosening his tie so that he can pull his collar even further apart, the wilting material gaping open to reveal the sweat-slicked hollow of this throat, the dip of his collarbones, and a hint of the colorful tattoos below. Ones he has never seen, he realizes, with a deep disappointment that isn't wholly new. Hermann drinks in details like he is studying Newt, like the world depends on his findings, and he tracks the sloppy swipe of Newt’s hand across his forehead until those hazy blue-green eyes narrow in on Hermann.

“Herms,” Newt croaks out, swaying closer and peering at him critically through glasses beginning to fog. “You’re … you’re not looking too good.”

Hermann’s instinctive sarcastic reply forms slowly, and he nearly bites his tongue swallowing it back when Newt reaches out a shaky hand to tilt Hermann’s chin and examine his flushed skin.

He can’t hope to stop his body’s trembling as Newt looks him over carefully, humming curious scientist noises in the back of his throat, but he does manage to barely suppress a needy sigh when Newt presses in closer and pulls at his eyelids to check his pupils.

“Hmm, pupils dilated, pulse elevated and erratic. Skin flushed and warm to the touch. I bet our core temperatures are through the roof.”

The hand holding Hermann’s chin moves to cup his flushed cheek, and the other presses gently against his forehead. Hermann shudders helplessly, hissing at even that simple touch.

Newt catches his eye then and inhales, sharp, like he’s just now realizing how close they’re standing, how strangely intimate his touch. He’s blinking rapidly, likely reeling as much as Hermann, but his hand slowly strays from Hermann’s forehead to card through his hair. Newt’s eyes are all pupil, and they’ve gone a little glazed as if he’s hypnotized, and Hermann doesn’t stop to think before leaning into the touch.

Sparks shiver over his scalp and down his spine in the wake of those careful fingers. His voice is thick when he murmurs, “Newt …” and he watches Newt’s heavy gaze drop to his lips. They sway a fraction closer.

And then Hermann gets his hands up and pushes Newt away with as much force as he can manage, stomping down hard on the bereft feeling at the loss of the hot, enticing fingers on his neck. Newt stumbles back a step, and they’re both standing there, breathing heavy and swaying on their feet, when Newt jerks his head up, eyes suddenly, incomprehensibly bright again.

“Oh my god, I know what happened to us!” Newt shrieks in an excited jumble, hands out. “We’ve been sex pollened!”

Hermann’s blood had cooled slightly with some distance between them, but just hearing that word from Newt’s lips sends another unbearable rush of heat to his gut. “What?”

“You know, some kind of alien substance that increases adrenergic activity in the body, usually posing a danger to the heart or nervous system until you do something to relieve the … tension.” Newt’s erratic explanation barely pauses before he goes tumbling on, full speed. “A favorite of science fiction for decades. There’s actually been some really interesting theoretical work with a species of deep sea fish that might produce a substance with similar effects –”

“Newton,” Hermann grinds out. “Are you telling me we could be dying right now?”

It certainly felt like it. Heat swaddled his head in a faint feeling, and the pressure … the pressure was beyond belief, so much that it was a struggle to draw breath.

That gets Newt to pause, at least for a moment. “Well, I have no idea. But if you’re feeling it half as strongly as I am, there’s definite potential for bodily harm.”

Newt looks almost excited at the prospect. Hermann sternly reminds his body that the urge to throttle him is not the same as the urge to devour him.

“And you think that giving in to these … urges will make it stop?” Hermann hates the imperceptible eager twist to his words with the small part of his thoughts he could spare to self-deprecation. Needy. Desperate.  _Pathetic_.

“Again, I have no idea,” Newt pants, eyes manic. “But sexual activity does flush the system in a variety of ways, and the body naturally goes about regulating things like pulse and core temperature after rigorous activity. Plus, I’ve seen enough Star Trek to know how sex pollen works, dude.”

Hermann hears himself correct him, faintly: “It’s not a pollen; it came from an animal.”

But for once Newt would not be distracted by petty arguing. He just grins, bright, and steps back into Hermann’s space.

Hermann’s free hand shoots up to wave him off, and he would have shoved his cane between them as further deterrent if it wasn’t currently vital to his ability to stand.

“We … We should go to medical,” he manages to choke out. “Let the doctors sort it out.”

Newt raises an eyebrow at him, but the small — dare he say fond? — smile doesn’t waver.

“We’re on quarantine, remember? An hour of mandatory lockdown. And yeah, this sucks, but I haven’t seen any clear evidence that it’s life threatening, have you?”

Hermann’s frown answers for him.

“So, I really don’t think it’s worth potentially exposing the rest of the base because we’re uncomfortable.”

“Right, of course, the quarantine,” Hermann says, vaguely. “Quite right, Newton.”

How could he forget? He must really not be thinking clearly if Newt was reminding him of proper procedures. The lack of control sends a sick chill down his spine to compete with the hot, roiling urge to be closer, to grab any part of Newt that comes near. He keeps his hands on his cane  and his elbows in, just in case.

With another vacant nod, Newt leans over to one of their terminals and stabs at a few buttons, sending the usual message up to LOCCENT that the incident is contained and they’re starting the clock on their mandatory quarantine period.

“So … what now?” Newt gestures broadly, the beginnings of a teasing grin on his lips, and Hermann has to turn away.

“I’m not acting on some inane theory of yours that you got from a Star Trek episode, Newton!” Hermann says it in the direction of his blackboard, and he’s unspeakably grateful when it comes out sounding convincing. “We will simply wait until the end of the quarantine and trust the medical experts to take care of us.”

Yes, that is the smart thing to do. In fact, the only thing to do. The alternative is unthinkable. And not even the least bit tempting, raging fever or no. Hermann had rid himself of that particular bit of delusional pining years ago, when he’d finally met his erstwhile pen pal in person and been firmly reminded that he was not the sort of man one desired.

“Suit yourself,” Newt drawls, hopping up to sit, legs splayed, on the edge of his desk. “But I have a feeling this is going to get worse before it gets better.”

Another wave of dizziness sweeps over Hermann, as if eager to prove Newt right. He grips tighter to his cane and takes another wobbly step toward his side of the lab.

In the ensuing silence, he can feel every inch between them like hooks in his skin, pulling him back to Newt. He’d put barely two feet between them when he gives up and collapses into his desk chair, shifting his weight off his bad hip.

There is nowhere in the suddenly claustrophobic lab he can look and not have to see Newt in his periphery. He resolutely faces away, but from the corner of his eye, he tracks the restless way Newt shifts against the desk. The sloppy splay of his legs in those damnable jeans is intoxicating — the world is ending, and where in that world had Newton Geiszler managed to find  _skinny jeans_  — and Hermann is rapidly losing the battle against his straying eyes.

He not-watches as Newt coughs pitifully and groans, raising a shaking hand to push at his sweat-damp hair and tearing at his open collar with his free hand. Clumsy fingers fumble open another button, wrench off his tie with a sharp zip of silk against cotton, then loose another button. And another.

The crinkled white fabric parts, the cacophony of bright colors beneath is slick with sweat and heaving from uneven breaths, and Hermann is only distantly aware of swaying closer. His throat burns with the urge to kiss, to lick, to  _bite,_  and god, has he ever felt this way before?

The motion must catch Newt’s attention, or maybe he feels the magnetic pull between them too, because he looks straight at him then, eyes dark and intent and more serious than Hermann has ever seen. Newt lifts his chin and swallows hard, in what feels like slow motion, as Hermann's eyes trace the long lines of his neck and the soft curve of his jaw and knows with sudden clarity what it would feel like to press his lips there.

Hermann claws his own collar open, desperate for a clear breath in the thick, cloying air. He still can’t look away from Newt and the tempting picture he makes — splayed against the desk, legs and lips spread and every inch of him flushed and glistening — but Newt’s eyes drop honey-slow to Hermann’s exposed neck, then lower to his wrists as Hermann drags open his sleeves and pushes them up fitfully.

He swears he can feel the weight of Newt’s gaze like a hand on his burning skin, and he shivers against the goosebumps rising in its wake. Then Newt moans, low and unabashed, his legs spreading wider and hips shifting in a smooth rocking motion that’s positively lewd, and Hermann thinks he might swallow his own tongue.

“Come on man,” Newt whines, breathless, a wandering hand smoothing down his own chest. “This is crazy.”

Hermann jerks his head once, a sharp denial, but it doesn’t stop his legs from carrying him closer. His mind crawls, thoughts pulling apart like taffy, as everything goes vaguely bright around the edges. Looking at Newt, he feels positively intoxicated. Maybe it would be easier if he was.

“You’ve gotta be feeling just as shitty and wound up as I am,” Newt groans, voice like ground glass, eyes fluttering shut as he splays a hand across his stomach and shifts again. “This is torture! And it's been like, a minute!”

Hermann chokes, barely feeling the handle of his cane in his shaking hand, and suddenly he is just a step away from Newt, watching him writhe impatiently, utterly shameless in a way Hermann, somehow, always knew he would be.

Newt’s eyes snap open, and something untranslatable passes between them.  His breath catches painfully in his throat as Newt’s hand wanders to the front of his own stupidly tight jeans. Newt groans again, unsatisfied at the crude nudging and pushing that Hermann is watching with every molecule of his being.

“How long has it been since either of us have even touched someone? We need this, man. Wouldn’t it be so much easier to just give in?”

Would it? Hermann is sure there are reasons, good ones, why they shouldn’t.

But he … can’t recall any.

“It’s just a little,  _ha_ -” Newt breaks off to gasp as he palms himself roughly through denim, “sexy time. Doesn’t have to be a big deal. Just … friends, helping each other out, right?”

Hermann has always prided himself on self-control, an iron will, the careful control he exerts on every aspect of his life. But his resolve dissolves like tissue paper before this particular, tattooed, panting, idiotic temptation.

“I mean, considering the current situation … the unknown variables …”

“Yeah?” Newt groans, barely a word. His hand slows on his front and Hermann swallows. Loudly.

“That is to say, truly, all things considered, in our line of work, we can hardly be faulted for taking the …” He pauses delicately. “Errr, convenient option.”

Newt’s eyes gleam over a satisfied grin, but then Hermann is clutched between Newt's open knees and they are grasping at any part of each other they can reach, crushing themselves together, and Hermann is  _starving_  for it.

Now that the line has been crossed, Hermann drinks in every detail, every sound, every touch. He gets a hand tangled into the damp, softly curling mass of Newt’s hair and grips his hip like it’s the only thing keeping him standing. (And with the way he’d let his cane clatter to the floor, it might soon be.)

Hermann leans in to lick a stripe from Newt’s collarbone up to the stubble-rough edge of his jaw, and Newt gasps and arches against him, cupping Hermann’s cheek to pull him up and crash their lips together. With a low noise that Hermann barely recognizes as himself, he surges forward and bends Newt back over the desk, a hand stealing up under his barely fastened button-down as he licks into his mouth. Newt makes that delicious, shameless moan again, and Hermann thinks he could be satisfied to simply hold Newt still and discover creative ways to wrench that sound from him all night.

But just when he settles in to thoroughly and completely ravish him, Newt presses a hand to Hermann’s chest and leans back just enough to suck in a breath and start mumbling.

“I just, um, even in these circumstances you know you don’t have to do anything you don’t want … I mean, we could always try to wait it out, like you said …”

Hermann practically growls at him, and he would have to make time to be embarrassed about it later, because he is a little busy at present trying not to spontaneously combust before he gets to touch Newt’s skin.

“I just, I don’t want to do this as some kind of … obligation.”

Newt won’t even look at him now, shrinking back into the surface of the desk and losing his voice to the realm of pitch and panic.

“Like, I can’t have you being all stiff upper lip,  _lie back and think of England_  on me —”

It’s clear he’s losing it, and Hermann knows the feeling, so he cuts Newt off before he can disappear completely into his head.

“Please, Newton, let’s just get on with it. Needs must and all that,” Hermann chides, aiming for blasé and failing miserably. Then, with a voice even sharper than his frown:

“As if it’s not a hardship for you.”

“It’s not,” Newt counters instantly, expression unbearably open, honest, eyes as clear as kaiju blue. “I mean, it’s not like I haven’t thought about it before … And you’re, you know, you. It’s not a chore.”

That brings Hermann up short. Newt stares up at him, almost shy, and the moment is so incongruent with the way they’re still pressed together from the hips down, achingly hard, that Hermann has to swallow hysterical laughter.

“Then you should know, I’m not thinking of England,” he admits in a low voice, leaning down to nose at the soft skin behind Newt’s ear, inundated by the dizzying sky-blue scent of almonds. "Now can we get on with it?”

A full body shudder is apparently all the answer Hermann is going to get, because Newt just grips at the back of Hermann’s sweater and pulls him down and onto his open mouth, his groan of relief vibrating through them both as he clings tight.

Then he’s kissing that reckless mouth again, wet and open and filthy, while Newton clings and groans and scratches a hand through the short bristles at the crown of Hermann’s head. Hermann kisses and bites at his lips, greedy, grinding against Newt’s trapped erection with a ruthless pressure and reveling in the way Newt chokes and breaks the kiss to gasp for air. He uses the opportunity to kiss down Newt’s neck to his collar, then lower, to trace his tongue along the brilliant curves of ink peeking out from his gaping shirt.

Newt’s hands are everywhere, scrabbling and desperate to rid Hermann of his clothes. Between the two of them, they manage to strip Hermann of his sweater, shirt and undershirt (with some ripping sounds that would have concerned him if he’d had the capacity to care) and leave them in a puddle on the lab’s eternally sticky floor.

As soon as Hermann is free and bare-chested before him, Newt drags one work-rough palm down his thin chest and cards the other through his disheveled hair, blunt fingers twisting and tugging to drag him closer. Hermann fumbles the rest of Newt’s buttons open, too impatient to drag the shirt all the way off, darting in to mouth the sweet-salt tang of amaretto and sweat from the cacophony of colors dripping down Newt’s front. Hermann grunts, jerks against the pressure at his scalp, and is struck by the unprecedented, vicious urge to bite and suck the skin beneath his mouth, to leave his own mark of vibrant colors to compete with the monsters who had made their claim on Newton all these years.

Newt arches, gasping, dragging the four sharp points of his relentlessly chewed fingernails down Hermann's back in white-hot lines, and the heavy aching weight between Hermann's legs demands attention. The throbbing of his prick drives him forward to rut into the rise of Newt's hip, blessed friction sending shivers twitching along his overheated skin. Newt's mouth falls open and he clutches at Hermann's hips and ass, dragging him closer. Hermann smooths one fever-hot hand down the length of Newt’s thigh and hitches it further around his waist, shoving them together.

After a breathless moment of rolling hips and demanding hands, Hermann pushes himself back with difficulty, leaning up to bite at Newt's cherry-red lips as he grabs his hips and rocks them together in earnest. Newt jerks against him, arching up for more, and Hermann answers by rutting back in an unsteady rhythm, inexpert but delicious. Every jolt of their trapped cocks sends showers of sparks down his spine and he might be groaning, whining, utterly wanton into Newt's mouth.

Newt moans brokenly into the sloppy kiss and sets about mauling every inch of Hermann he can reach. His every touch burns, building the fever impossibly higher, a hazy blue tint overtaking Hermann’s vision. They have not even moved to discard the most important clothing between them when they jerk violently into each other as if part of the same creature, orgasm taking Hermann by surprise, and he is coming so hard he loses time, pleasure singeing his every nerve as Newt whines into his neck.

When he comes down they are still pressed together, gasping into each other’s shoulders, drenched and sticky. And still … very much alive.

Hermann expects to be immediately uncomfortable, to regret their rash decision, or at the very least to be disgusted at the mess. But all he feels is relaxed, drifting, even comfortable, as he leans into and absolutely does not cuddle the warm, soft skin of Newt’s shoulder or revel in the intimate smell of closeness.

Eventually, after far too short a pause, Newt speaks up:

“So, uh, do you think that did the trick, or …?” But his sentence cuts off with a hitch as Hermann shifts to look at him, sliding their bodies together again as if out of instinct. An instinct he hoped had abated.

Hermann sways, catching himself with a palm square in the center of Newt’s colorful chest, and he feels the heat rising again with an inexorable rush.

“Oh,” he said, trying to understand. It was immensely difficult.

“Er, yeah.  _Oh_.” Newt looks like he's trying very hard to stay still even while pressed against his front. Hermann doesn't want him to, and neither does his prick, straining unfazed by the life-changing orgasm and aching against the scratchy, soaked front of his trousers.

He wets his lips and finds Newt staring at him. At his lips. His gut jumps shamelessly as he does it again.

“So …”

Newt’s hands are back on him, sliding up his back and down his sides, but before they can start again properly, Newt shakes his head as if to clear it and presses gently at Hermann's chest, urging him back onto his own feet, though his hands do not leave his waist. Another stab of protest from his leg, louder this time, but still not loud enough to distract from his laser focus on Newt’s bruised lips.

Newt, however, must notice his flinch. “Your leg—”

“Forget it,” Hermann dismisses, hands tangling intently in the gaping sides of Newt’s shirt.

“Herms …” Newt starts to protest, but Hermann cuts him off by surging forward and kissing him again.

So Newt just gets a good grip on his hips and walks him slowly backward until they hit the edge of the sagging old lab couch. Hermann whines, loud and high and unashamed, when Newt breaks the kiss and pushes him roughly onto the fraying cushions, but Newt follows him down not a second later, straddling Hermann’s haphazardly sprawled legs and finally,  _finally_  shrugging out of his shirt.

The motion is smooth, unselfconscious, even effortless, and Hermann’s mind clears just enough to flinch at his own relative lack of experience suddenly bearing down on him. But Newt is leaning in, pressing him firmly into the back of the couch with miles of colorful skin on display. Newt kisses him voraciously, and the first touch of their still-hard cocks blows Hermann’s mind clean like a mushroom cloud.

Something dark and feral in Hermann’s gut demands more than clumsy clothed frottage this time, and he is more than willing to oblige, tearing frantically at Newt’s zipper. It’s a tight fit with his legs spread wide across Hermann’s lap and his jeans practically painted to his skin, but Hermann manages to free him from pants and briefs and get a hand around his sticky cock, hot and heavy and twitching at his touch.

Newt groans low in his throat and rocks forward when Hermann tightens his grip and strokes experimentally, a glut of precum joining the previous mess to slick the way. It has been too long since he’s had his hand around someone else's prick (and a fair while since he’s touched his own), but what he is surely missing in technique, he hopes to make up for with enthusiasm. He pumps Newt again, with a bit more pressure and a twist of his wrist, and Newt collapses against him with a reedy gasp, a bead of sweat dropping from his nose onto Hermann's shoulder as his hunched shoulders shake.

Newt’s scrabble at Herman’s pants, but every pull of the hand on his cock seems to fracture his  labmate's usually laser-sight concentration, interrupting his quest to get Hermann’s zipper undone and drawing obscene noises from Newt’s bruised lips. It doesn’t take long for Newt to give up altogether, in favor of gripping Hermann’s shoulders and grinding down against him, into his dripping hand.

It’s Hermann’s turn to be distracted by the desperate circling of Newt's hips, the heaving chest and jumping muscles in his stomach, the slack-jawed and pupils blown look of hunger on his familiar face. The rhythm of strokes he's been building is interrupted by a full-body shudder and the painful pulse of his neglected cock still trapped beneath the scratchy fabric of his slacks. He only just manages to clutch at the soft dip of Newt's back, then the thick muscles of his thigh, abandoning his grip on his cock in favor dragging the man closer for some kind of deeper, better friction.

“Hermann,” Newt groans, hands clutching at his hair and sliding fitfully against his pale chest as he writhes against him. “Hermann, please, c'mon, I need —  _please_.”

Part of Hermann wants to ask him what he needs, encourage him to spell it out in excruciating detail and watch as he dissects himself in front of him, but one look at Newt’s blue-green eyes gone dark and glassy with want has Hermann slamming their lips together again, ready to eat him alive with teeth and tongue, and fumbling at his own zipper.

Finally, he gets himself free, his prick straining full and red and leaking against his stomach. Newt grabs for his hand, then, breaking the kiss just long enough to drag his tongue in a wide, wet stripe through the mess on Hermann’s palm — eyes pinned mercilessly on his, and Hermann forgets how to breath — before pulling it down and wrapping it around them both.

The first touch draws a broken sound from them both, and the delicious slide of their cocks together might have been enough to send Hermann over the edge if he hadn’t cum once already. Or perhaps it's the blue singing in his blood and demanding more, but it doesn't matter — he has to have it. He has to have Newt.

Hermann strokes them both with one broad, long-fingered hand, trying to keep his pace slow and steady, wanting to draw this out almost as much as much as his body screamed for more. More of the heady slide of Newt against him, more of Newt’s tongue pressing against his own, more of the intoxicating heat building between them. More of everything.

Enough to last him, when this impossible fever cools and all the closeness seems a distant and singularly desperate dream.

He strokes and pulls at their pricks, all straining and hot in his dripping palm, and Newt tears his mouth away to press his face into the slick skin of Hermann’s neck. Newt shudders uncontrollably now, rocking his hips into Hermann’s grip and clutching spasmodically at his back, and it takes Hermann’s foggy brain a long moment to realize Newt is speaking, jumbled syllables that sound like Hermann’s name, over and over.

Hermann’s own consciousness is fading into overwhelming sensation as Newt gasps brokenly into his neck, begging. Desperate. Far away, his legs are going numb and cramped from Newt's weight, but pain is a flimsy illusion against the backdrop of this fever.

And Hermann can do nothing but grip him tighter, stroke faster, using the hand clawed into Newt’s back to pull him even tighter against him as they rock into the wet heat of their cocks pressed together. When Newt arches back after one particularly brutal thrust, Hermann glimpses something deep and wet and dangerous in Newt’s eyes that he couldn't name, possibly had never seen before.

Instead, he clamps one long hand down on the back of Newt’s flushed neck, pressing him firmly to his cheek and growling into his ear, “I am here, Newton. It's alright, I have you. I have you.”

“Hermann,” Newt sobs, achingly soft against his cheek, and Hermann is violently sure he can’t bear to hear what comes next. So he turns his head and kisses him, deep and ravenous, and swallows down the wild moan as Newt cums, shuddering, pulling Hermann right over the cliff with him.

Hermann knows nothing but blue-tinted, almond-scented haze, then a riotous swirl of colors and a dizzying slide sideways, until he finds himself stretched out on the too-small lab couch with Newt’s face squashed against his collarbone. He holds his breath for a moment (or an eternity), wondering if the cycle would begin again, but he could already feel their bodies cooling and their breath slowing.

He has barely regained his breath when the exhaustion hits him, heavy and warm and insistent. Newton is a soft, sleepy weight against his chest, and it is the easiest thing in the world to loop his arms around him and gather him closer, into his bare chest. Newt’s soft, pleased noise is the last thing Hermann hears before he falls asleep.

An indefinite time later, the echoing quiet of the lab is broken by Tendo’s voice ringing loud and distorted over the staticky intercom, announcing the end of the quarantine period.

Hermann wakes, but swims to awareness slowly, his head and mouth stuffed with almond-scented cotton. He gets his eyes opened in time to blink down and watch Newt — who Hermann swears could sleep through a direct kaiju attack — merely grumble and burrow further into Hermann’s chest.

Hermann’s naked chest. Which he is laying on. Pressing into.  _Cuddling_.

There’s nothing else to call it, and Hermann is relieved to find his capacity for embarrassment swiftly returning. His heart skips a beat and then smacks down with a horribly hollow thud, and he just barely manages not to tense his arms or jerk his face away from the soft, warm fluff of of Newt’s hair — or kick Newt off the couch and run to his bunk to begin composing his transfer request.

This is a disaster. Of course, they were under the influence of an alien substance. And there was always the small chance Newt would surprise him with his ability to act like an adult about this, but Hermann was not naive or delusional enough to think that what they did came without implications. Sticky, emotional implications that he could already feel worming their way into him like cracks in the brittle surface of a jaeger’s conn-pod, threatening the structural integrity of what they had … whatever it was they had. A working relationship? A stimulating kind of intellectual rivalry? He's fast forgetting, their history rewritten in the silence of their accidental repose, with Newt breathing quietly under his chin.

Still, he must admit that it’s actually rather … nice, like this. A warm weight, a solid presence in his arms, an easy intimacy — even if it's only a temporary illusion. Newt, quiet and peaceful and safely in his orbit.

Hermann could get up now. He could get cleaned up, file the necessary paperwork, reestablish the proper boundaries that would protect him. He should, in fact. But the heavy lab doors are still closed and locked, and they won’t be missed in medical for a while longer. And anyway, they’re both sure to be exhausted after this ordeal.

The paperwork could wait. The protocol could wait. The boundaries could wait.

So Hermann closes his eyes, pulls Newt more firmly against him, and allows himself to enjoy it just a little while longer.


End file.
